As in past years the 2014 Dumbo Arts Festival has something for everyone. Interactive installations for those who like to take part in their art, crafts for our little ones, open studios for anyone who would like to learn more about the creative process, and exhibitions for the gallery experience loving audience.
For this years festival, Masters Projects is pleased to present Lost Corcosa, a group exhibition curated by Todd Masters. The exhibit title and theme is pulled from Robert W. Chambers' book of horror short stories published in 1895, entitled The King in Yellow. A variety of media will be shown—installation, mixed-media, painting, photography, drawing, sculpture, collage, street art—and a number of artists represented: ASVP, bunny M, Dain, Dee Dee, Elle, ENX, Amze Emmons, gilf!, Nicolas Holiber, Amanda Marie, Timothy Paul Myers, QRST, RAE, Jon Rappleye, Joram Roukes, Shin-Shin, Nathan Vincent, Charles Wilkin, X-O and more.
Carcosa is a fictional city in the Ambrose Bierce short story "An Inhabitant of Carcosa" (1891). In Bierce’s story, the ancient and mysterious city is barely described, and is viewed only in hindsight (after its destruction) by a character who once lived there. The city was later used more extensively in Robert W. Chambers' book of horror short stories published in 1895 entitled The King in Yellow. Chambers had read Bierce's work and had also borrowed a few other names (including Hali and Hastur) from Bierce's work. In Chambers' stories, which is mentioned several times within them, the city is a mysterious, ancient, and possibly cursed place. The most precise description of its location given is that it said to be located on the shores of Lake Hali in the Hyades. The descriptions given of it make it clear that it must be located on another planet, or possibly even in another universe.
Focusing on his interest in an artists’ ability to break boundaries through visual storytelling and innovative uses of media, Masters combines a selection of signature works by a diverse group of contemporary international artists. Filled with cultural differences, artistic processes and aesthetic traditions; works within this exhibition wrestle with complex topics such as the veracity of history, the nature of interpretation, subjective versus objective truth, and the ways in which objects and images from the past embody cultural memory. Though the show includes a variety of media and narratives based on a wide range of artistic practices and personal experiences, Masters’ amalgamates the collection of works by loosely referencing subjects and themes found within Chambers' description of Corcosa.